This invention relates to the field of hurricane shutters which form a temporary barrier across openings in buildings or other structures to prevent damage to the interior of the structures by wind, debris and water. Specifically, the invention is directed toward permanently mounted folding or accordion shutters which have a stacked position which clears an opening and a deployed position which temporarily spans the opening.
Since Hurricane Andrew hit south Florida, the state government and the hurricane shutter industry have developed a set of standards and the equipment to meet or exceed those standards. There are different requirements for residential houses, low rise buildings and high rise buildings. There are many shutter systems which comply with these standards, including the shutters of this invention.
The building or construction industry has, long ago, standardized the size of building components, including the sizes of openings, so that standard sized doors and windows may be manufactured economically off site. Because there is need for different sized mass produced windows and doors, the standard sizes differ in multiples of six inches.
Conventionally, accordion folded hurricane shutters are made from extruded aluminum with blade assemblies of set dimensions and angular orientation. A blade assembly usually includes two blades joined with an intermediate longitudinal knuckle joint, and knuckle elements on each longitudinal free edge. To fit a shutter to a window, the number of blade assemblies is determined that will cover the horizontal span of the window. Adjusting the shutters to fit different sized windows merely requires adding or subtracting the number of blade assemblies to be used. However, this practice results in some windows having excess blade assemblies because of the difference in the window size and the blade assembly size.
The major function of hurricane shutters is to provide protection for windows, doors and other openings of a building to prevent failure of the optical covering, such as glass or other transparent materials, or other structurally weak elements. The hurricane shutters are designed to deflect wind, rain and stop wind carried debris from breeching the more fragile devices which close openings in normal weather conditions. The hurricane shutters also have a security function regardless of weather. To this end, several shutter designs incorporate some type of locking devices.
Another important feature of hurricane shutters is the ease and convenience of deploying the shutters on the building or motor home, RV, boat, etc. While weather forecasting and storm tracking are much improved, nobody is really sure of the areas of most potential damage for more than 12 hours. In this time frame, weather conditions in the affected area have deteriorated making the handling of any large heavy objects extremely difficult. For these reasons, and others, the pre-installed shutters are very popular.
Pre-installed or mounted shutters must be unobtrusive, pleasing in appearance, and unrestrictive in normal weather conditions. In normal weather conditions, the shutters are in a stacked or folded position clear of the opening about which they are mounted. In the deployed position, the shutters completely span the opening forming a continuous barrier across the opening. However, the criteria for the stacked position and the deployed position are sometimes at odds, in the view of the consumer. For example, a house with several different window sizes may have one size window with folded accordion shutters forming a narrow border on each side of one window and a much broader border on another window with a minor window size distinction. This variation may be 10 to 15% from window to window. This gives a haphazard look to the shutter installation detracting from the appearance of the house. For example, conventional shutters come in sizes of 5.4 inches or 6.8 inches and for a conventional window of 54 inches, the nearest shutter size may be 58 inches with a surplus of 4 inches. The next size window may have no surplus shutters. This same situation is true in the low rise and high rise shutters.
What is needed in the art is a hurricane shutter system that will result in a uniform appearance to the stacked hurricane shutters on different sized windows.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,477,903 to Figueiredo et al is directed to an accordion folded hurricane shutter with particular emphasis on the angular orientation of the blades in the deployed position.
The Werner et al patent, U.S. Pat. No. 5,601,130, relates to an accordion shutter with a center mate for connecting opposite sides of the shutter in the deployed position.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,957,185 to Robinson et al relates to an accordion shutter system with opposing shutter sections fastened together by center mates. Robinson et al teaches that the length or span can readily be altered by using more or fewer shutter members. This conventional approach would result in hurricane shutters with a different number of blades for windows varying as little as one inch. For example, if a window and a shutter system size coincided there would be no excess blades in the stacked position. But if the next window were one inch bigger another set of blades would be required making the stack bigger. This excess of blades would increase as windows got larger until a window size was reached which would again coincide with the number of blades.
Currently all shutter manufacturers have either two or three systems divided into residential, low rise and high rise. For each system, they produce separate blades, center mates, starter strips, and roaming connectors, nylon bushings and several types of tracks. The three different systems would require about 18 different extrusions for each system. This creates a very large inventory of components. Each inventory item is then produced in, at least, four colors which results in an inventory of at least 216 items for one complete inventory.
Disclosed is a hurricane shutter system with accordion folding shutter assemblies sized on the mathematical relationship between the deployed length of the shutter, the stacked or folded length of the shutter and the size of a conventional opening in a structure. The relationship results in a shutter system that will fit different sized conventional openings with the least number of shutter assemblies and without excess assemblies. The system also results in universal sized components for the residential, low rise and high rise buildings differing only in the strength of the shutters.
Accordingly, it is an objective of the instant invention to teach a hurricane shutter system which will present a uniform stacked appearance with different sized standard window and door openings in residential, low rise and high rise structures. The clear span of the standard sized openings and the clear span of the stacked shutters is approximately the same.
It is a further objective of the instant invention to teach an accordion shutter system with standardized center mate elements for fastening opposite horizontal sections.
It is yet another objective of the instant invention to teach an accordion hurricane shutter system in which there is a size relationship between the stacked size of the blades and other elements and the deployed size of the blades and other elements.
It is a still further objective of the invention to teach the size relationship between the stacked size and the deployed size is related to standard sizes of openings which results in a shutter system sized to fit standard openings without excess blades.
Other objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings wherein are set forth, by way of illustration and example, certain embodiments of this invention. The drawings constitute a part of this specification and include exemplary embodiments of the present invention and illustrate various objects and features thereof.